The first step was to get my images from Illustrator to Photoshop. It took me a while to get things started but I think I’ve got something worked out. I was exporting different file types from Illustrator but I eventually settled on just copying and pasting from one to the other. There’s probably a much more elegant way to get the information over, but this seems to work (for now).
I created two separate layers for the framework and the line art. From there, I created a layer for the background color, then one for the foreground color. I finished the background color and I’m probably about 75% through the foreground color. This is going to take some time. I have to really be careful with the art pad so as not to wear down the nib (tip of the stylus). I predict my going through quite a few (they’re replaceable).
Just a bit about the art pad. It’s pretty damn good. I’m using the Wacom Intuos 5 (small) and the buttons on the left really come in handy, especially the ability to use the dial to quickly change the brush size. I think that part alone is gonna cut my time in half. It’s also got the hand tool (which I was using a lot for inking) and the dropper tool as default buttons, both which come in extremely handy.
Tomorrow I have to finish the foreground color and begin the shading/highlight process. I’m not sure how much detail I’m going to go into for the shadowing, it’s taking long enough just to do the basic colors. There might be a more efficient way to do it than just using different (darker/lighter) versions of the colors. I’ll see about that tomorrow.
Coloring is exciting! It’s really starting to look more like a finished product. Oh, I was watching Battleship tonight, lol. It was silly but not awful.